Don't take the buyout, union leader tells government employees, it is not a good deal

Thursday is the deadline for federal employees to accept President Donald Trump’s so-called buyout offer, something open to potentially 20,000 workers in New Mexico.

The Trump administration estimates approximately 1% of the federal workforce has accepted the offer, which comes as part of an effort led by tech mogul Elon Musk and the Department of Government Efficiency to shrink the federal workforce by as much as 10%.

The deferred resignation offer is not necessarily a better deal for a federal employee than a severance package down the line, should the Trump administration follow through on threats of widespread layoffs.

If there is a reduction in workforce, the maximum amount of severance pay for federal employees is a full year’s salary, according to the Office of Personnel Management. A federal employee making $73,619 annually who has worked for the federal government for 18 years could receive an estimated $73,372 in severance pay after a layoff. That same employee would likely get closer to $42,944 if they took the deferred resignation offer.

The resignation offer could also impede already understaffed federal services, like Veterans Affairs and the U.S. Forest Service, according to a labor union president.

“We are dangerously low in wildland firefighters already. ... The VA has hovered around 40, 50, 60,000 vacancies at any one time,” said Randy Erwin, national president of the National Federation of Federal Employees, a labor union with significant membership in New Mexico, including civilian White Sands Missile Range employees and workers at the U.S. Forest Service headquarters in Albuquerque. “We just don’t have the expertise that we need. We don’t have the kinds of doctors that we need. Then the wait time for veterans becomes months and months long.”

New Mexico had at least 22,343 civilian federal employees as of March 2024, according to a Congressional Research Service Report. As of 2017, New Mexico had just over 1% of the nearly 1.9 million federal workers in the category targeted by the resignation offer, according to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.

Federal employees with positions related to national security or immigration enforcement are not eligible for the offer, nor are postal or military employees.

Labor unions have urged members not to accept the deferred resignation because of questions about whether the Trump administration would actually pay employees and the vague information about the terms of the offer.

“There is not yet any evidence the administration can or will uphold its end of the bargain, that Congress will go along with this unilateral massive restructuring, or that appropriated funds can be used this way, among other issues that have been raised,” the American Federation of Government Employees, a labor union that represents 800,000 federal and D.C. government workers, said in an email message to members.

The federal budget — and therefore many agency budgets — is still operating on continuing resolutions instead of an annual budget. A continuing resolution temporarily continues funding at the same level as was previously approved by Congress in a past budget. In this case, Congress approved a continuing resolution in December, which will expire on March 14. Labor unions have warned members that the Trump Administration may not be able to guarantee payouts past that deadline.

A sample contract for the offer sent to Environmental Protection Agency employees appeared to acknowledge that funding is not guaranteed after the continuing resolution expires, NPR reported. An Office of Personnel Management guide says employees are entitled to back pay if the government shuts down during congressional budget negotiations.

The email Trump’s budget office sent to workers says that for employees who do not resign, the majority of federal employees will have to work in-person, workplace performance standards will be updated, and the majority of federal agencies will be downsized. There will be “enhanced standards of suitability and conduct ... Employees who engage in unlawful behavior or other misconduct will be prioritized for appropriate investigation and discipline, including termination,” the letter reads.

The letter promises that employees who resign under the deferred resignation program will retain pay and benefits and be exempted from in-person work requirements until Sept. 30. Federal employees, except military personnel and U.S. Postal Service employees, were eligible to accept the deferred resignation until Thursday, Feb. 6.

“It is clear by the fact that they did this that this administration does not care about the critical services that federal employees do for America, because any one agency could have a tremendously high percentage of workers say, ‘We’re out,’” Erwin said.

If federal employees continue in their jobs, they could be impacted by layoffs. The Trump administration has warned it plans reductions in force after the deadline for deferred resignations.

“There is a reduction in force procedure ... It’s realistic that could happen, but we think no matter how it plays out, people would be better off not accepting this deferred resignation offer,” Erwin said.